Postscript: Public safety and pension costs were cited as the two main components of fiscal stress. The same person who made this observation also used Vallejo's (California) bankruptcy as an example of how to play Moneyball with rising fiscal costs. Vallejo experienced decades of robust population growth leading up to the fiscal stress. The people in power couldn't blame a shrinking city. I think demographic decline has become a red herring for fiscal stress in Rust Belt cities. Brain drain makes a nice scapegoat in places where nonprofits that can't be taxed gobble up prime urban real estate.